Cast Recording

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 1:41pm

on another thread musicalfandukie wrote...

"if you go to http://www.amazon.co.uk/ they call alot of the cast recordings soundtracks...maybe we should write them hate mail!!..lol...."

Well, not hate mail but ask them to update or change it. On the amazon.com site in the USA many listings say both which is still not correct, but better.

My point made in the other thread was that since all movie albums are also cast recordings, let's encourage the elimination of the phrase "Soundtrack" and just use the standard "cast recording" - CR for short - for discussing all movie and show recordings.

I know, some people don't care but if you really don't care why not just use the shorter CR term.

Can we look forward to the day when people here will be asking "When is the Toronto CR for LORD OF THE RINGS coming out?"

[Thenardier]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 1:43pm

"My point made in the other thread was that since all movie albums are also cast recording"

Movies albums are soundtracks. So re-make your point.

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:40pm

My point, as outlined in the previous thread is that the term "soundtrack" actually means the audio strip along the side of a film. In the 1940s M-g-M records pioneered the idea of recording selections "directly from the soundtrack" and releasing them on records. These were called Soundtrack Albums. The industry later abbreviated it to just the word "Soundtrack."

Because of sound quality issues, very few movie soundtracks are actually recorded directly from the film soundtracks any more. If you listen to older discs of actual soundtrack recordings...THE MUSIC MAN on Warner Bros for example or some of the old M-g-M soundtrack albums, they all have a flat "boxy" sound quality.

They films are recorded that way on purpose, oterwise the sound would be too hollow in the large movie theatres. On records, however, they sound dull and flat.

In the 1960s some labels like Columbia (for WEST SIDE STORY, MY FAIR LADY, FUNNY GIRL and 1776) just added a lot of reverb to the records.

Capitol Records got around this by having the movie casts of OKLAHOMA!, CAROUSEL and KING AND I re-record the scores in studio for release on records. (They even put the phrase "from the soundtrack of the motion picture" on the Lp covers, even though the Lps were not!) You will notice if you listen to the original soundtrack albums for these films that the Overtures and some of the songs are completely different performances. The recent "expanded" editions on Angel incorporate additional material taken from the actual film soundtrack.

Today they can digitally alter and remix the sound for theatrical and home video use, and again for CD release. That is why soundtracks often do not sound like the performances you hear on your DVD of the movie.

While it IS correct to call movie sountracks "cast recordings" (since they are the movie casts), it is incorrect to call a cast recording a soundtrack. Calling cast albums "soundtracks" implies that the cast is lip-synching to pre-recorded tapes and that the Cd's are just transferred from those tapes. Now WE all know that isn't the case at all.

For this reason I would like to see the term "soundtrack" eliminated for good: Cd's would be billed as "movie cast" or "movie score" (for background scores), Broadway cast, London cast, Toronto cast etc.
Example:

GREASE - Original Browadway cast recording (M-g-M)
- Broadway revival cast recording (RCA Victor)
- Movie cast recording (RSO)
- London cast recording (Epic)


Makes perfect sense to me...

(Some of the above was cut and pasted in from the other thread...)